Succulents Box: September Top Fan & October 2020 Subscription Boxes

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Hello!

Last week was rough and I felt physically and mentally drained so I stayed off my laptop as much as I could. I took time this past weekend to recharge. I’m kind of glad for the extra hour we gained but it feels weird. I wanted to share this post last week but I didn’t make time for it. I promise I’ll have a somewhat more consistent blogging schedule and post about things other than my little plants in the next few months. I’m a bit all over the place right now, so I need to get my groove back. Thank you for bearing with me!

I’ll hop right into the post now, but I hope you had a lovely weekend! It was beautiful. I forgot that Saturday was Halloween. I was sad to not have trick-or-treaters, but probably for the best since COVID. More candy for us!

Alexis came to visit and we all went on a small hike at a nearby park. We went to Home Depot this past Saturday because Stephen needed something for work. While he searched for whatever he needed, Alexis and I looked at their succies. She fell in love with one in particular, so we bought it! I’m happy that she’s joining the club.

Anyway, I’ll introduce you to the remaining eight succulents we have. Tell me which is your favorite, if you can choose just one! Last week was cloudy and rainy. I was worried about how the plants would do without sunlight for like four days since we aren’t using a grow light at the moment. t’s supposed to be sunny this whole week, so hopefully the plants perk up!

Top Fan Box

If you aren’t familiar with Succulents Box on social media, they have a private Facebook customer care group and they also use the Top Fan feature to give those with the badge a gift card to buy more plants!

After interacting more on their Facebook page, I was thrilled to get the Top Fan badge! At the beginning of October, SB ran a special that if you purchased three plants, you would receive a free mystery one. We ordered within the offer’s timeframe and the box arrived on the 10th.

The downfall of just ordering plants from SB is that, unlike when you sign up for subscription boxes, regular boxes and orders do not come with I.D. cards, which I really wish they would since the cards tell you how much light and the type of soil each plant needs. I’m keeping a notebook and will make a spreadsheet of my plants so I can keep up with the care schedule.

Stephen’s Plant Choices

I let Stephen choose two and I picked one. His picks were the Fenestraria Baby Toes and Sedum Donkey’s Tail.

We’ve watched videos with the Baby Toes buried deeply and more compact but other videos show that they don’t have to be. Since they are a more fragile plant, they were shipped bare rooted in gift wrap and bubble wrap as protection. I had to trim off some leaves when we first got them.

The recent picture makes me super sad because we had to remove more unhealthy leaves. They have reduced to about a fourth of that size now.

The survivors, as of today. I know, they’re still looking rough but we have lots of hope that they’ll pull through!

I read that these can be tricky to keep alive but they require very little watering since they’re similar to Lithops.

The Donkey’s Tail plant was also shipped bare rooted and in bubble wrap. I was concerned about it surviving since it arrived in five pieces. We didn’t know if the tiny piece with the small, curled stalk and no roots would survive, but we placed all of the pieces in the soil to see what would happen.

I checked the baby one [very top one in the picture] 10 days ago to see if it was in the soil well enough to grow, and it had tiny pink roots! I gave it a few drops of water because I was so excited that it was actually growing. I forgot to take a picture of the roots to share on here; I’m sorry! I promise to snap one some when I propagate leaves in the future. I wanted to show Stephen its roots but he said he’ll take my word for it so I don’t stress out the plant.

My Plant Choice

After stalking Succulents Box’s website and succulents on social media, I’ve discovered that I tend to gravitate toward the Echeveria type. My pick this month was the Echeveria Violet Queen.

Isn’t she gorgeous!? I’m so excited for her to change colors someday! I’ll still buy other plant species of course, but I really love Echeverias.

The mystery plant we received is a Sempervivum Cobweb Hens and Chicks.

I’m still struggling with removing all of the soil that was in the shipping box off of the plant head. The web is delicate and I don’t want to remove it when trying to get the dirt out, so it looks like some debris will remain, for now.

Succulents from Home Depot

On the 11th of this month, a day after receiving the Top Fan box, we went to Home Depot so Stephen could get some things. We also browsed the succulents they had. Plants aren’t in the best conditions when buying from places like Home Depot and Lowe’s versus plant nurseries, but I couldn’t leave these babies behind to suffer and not be loved! [When we repotted Alexis’ succulent, there was a little bug in it! Not a fan of that.] Stephen used to work at Home Depot and he said the gardening center isn’t well trained on the plants. He felt guilty about killing a cactus once, but he’s learning now!

We didn’t plan on buying these, really. It wasn’t our intention to purchase more succulents, but we found these plump dudes and couldn’t leave them behind.

At first I thought the one on the left was a Pachyphytum Oviferum, also known as a Moonstone, but looking at a picture posted by a previous customer of their plant, it looks more like a Pachyveria Haagei since it’s not pink or as plump as Moonstones are. It’s a bit of a mystery since department stores label some plants differently. I’ll wait until it grows a little more to see if I can properly identify it.

Anyways, it’s still lovely and it’s a new favorite of mine! The other succulent we purchased was super, super pretty. We think it’s an Echeveria Fleur Blanc.

October 2020 Box

On the 13th, our subscription box arrived! It was like a succulent Christmas with all the new plants we received within a few days. Originally they were going to arrive a few days later, so I was stoked that they arrived earlier than expected!

Here are the succulents offered in the October box:

I loved all of the choices for this month’s box and I would’ve been happy with any of them. I got the Sempervivum Calcareum and the Echeveria Perle Von Nurnberg. Although, I may need to add the other two to my wishlist!

The Sempervivum Calcareum is so tiny and pointy! It could do some real damage. This one isn’t too difficult to take care of, and I’m looking forward to seeing it grow bigger and its leaves to expand.

The PVN has been a little trickier. I’ve had to remove some leaves that withered, but it’s healthier now! Hopefully I won’t have to pull any more leaves from it though. I’ll be sure to update how they are in a few months!

That’s all of our newest additions! I was Top Fan again for October, so Stephen and I ordered three more plants last night. Someone should really stop me from buying more. I can’t wait to share the next two boxes and I’ll be more prompt when doing so.

How are you doing, really?